Daily Archives: November, 9, 2010

The Justice Dept’s Inspector General, Glenn fine is charging that New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie engaged in a pattern of abuse when he was U.S. attorney by billing taxpayers to stay at luxury hotels, he said in a report Monday.

Probably not since the days of the Pharaohs or the more ludicrous Roman Emperors has an US attorney traveled in such pomp and expensive grandeur as the Republican governor, who recently killed the construction of a new rail line to New York under the Hudson River,

While lesser mortals – the Pope, Queen Elizabeth and so on – are usually happy to let their hosts handle most of the security and transport arrangements when they venture beyond their homes, NJ’s Chief Federal Prosecutor created a mini-New Jersey for himself, wherever he went, ensuring that nothing was left to chance.

The amount of money involved in the review of the Republican fat-cat’s travel vouchers is small, $2,176, a whopping $200 million a day*, but the IG’s report comes at a time when Christie’s political star is rising as he focuses on reducing the cost of government.

The U.S. attorney “provided insufficient, inaccurate or no justification” for 14 of the 15 trips, the report added.

Christie’s press secretary, Michael Drewniak, said Monday that “the governor thoroughly addressed this issue during the campaign, and I would refer you to his remarks then.”

During the campaign, Christie said he stayed in more expensive hotels only when cheaper ones weren’t available. “We always went for government rates first,” he said. “I don’t think there were a lot of stays in five-star hotels over seven years.”

The inspector general only examined travel back through 2007.

During that case, Christie “addressed the companies, their boards and senior management numerous times on their obligations and compliance with the deferred prosecution agreements,” Drewniak said in an e-mail.

In one instance related to the case, the inspector general wrote, the U.S. attorney traveled to India for meetings with representatives of a defendant company at the Nine Zero Hotel at a cost of $449 per night and booked the entire Taj Mahal Palace Hotel in Mumbai, the city’s most luxurious. — more than double the government rate of $220 per night in Boston, (and then some). It is not uncommon for the grander US attorneys to reserve a floor or two, but a whole hotel is unprecedented.

In the report, by Inspector General Glenn Fine, a footnote on transportation costs said the U.S. attorney took a prearranged car service ‘The Beast’, a gigantic, ‘pimped-up’ General Motors Cadillac which security experts say is, short of an actual battle tank, probably the safest road vehicle on the planet, on a four-mile trip to and from the Boston airport costing $236 round trip lots and lots.

“In another example of excessive transportation costs, his car service private jumbo jet, boasting double beds and suites, fitted out more like a luxury yacht, flew from a London airport to his hotel in central London cost $562 round trip, at a cost around $50,000 (£31,000) an hour to operate.

Christie is the first Republican elected New Jersey governor in a dozen years. He was a sought-after guest on the GOP campaign trail during the midterm elections.

Christie has left the door open for a 2016 presidential run. On Sunday, he said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he was “going to need a job” after 2013. He added: “So maybe it will be that. Who knows?”

Well, he can forget about running for anything but dog catcher after this story gets out. Jeez, I hope they throw the book at him.

“I am glad to meet an Indian communist. I am told that communists have been part of the (Indian) political mainstream,” Obama told CPM Politburo member Sitaram Yechury at the Rashtrapati Bhawan banquet as they were introduced and both shook hands.

Yechury told Obama that the Indian communists have been in the political mainstream “throughout”.

Marking a departure from their past practice, leaders and MPs of the CPM and CPI, known for their anti-US stance, had attended Obama’s speech in Parliament last evening.

The high table had the PM, Gursharan Kaur, the Obamas and Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and son Rahul Gandhi. The only other person at the table was UPA-2’s chief trouble shooter Pranab Mukherjee whose presence only cements his status of being more than a few notches above the rest of his ministerial colleagues.

Obama is learn’t to have asked Mukherjee about the entry of communists in India into the parliamentary system in India. Mukherjee is understood to have pointed out that Indian communists were part of the mainstream and like social democrats. Sonia sat next to the PM while Obama was seated beside her. Next was Michelle and then Rahul while Mukherjee completed the circle. The conversation did not flag with Rahul proving to be a keen listener and nodding frequently to what Obama and the PM had to say.

Well, that’s apparently where he heard about the success of Communists entering the mainstream in India, which he seems to have taken a keen interest in.